Tuesday, August 31, 2010

Water Department Signs Remain

Every public hearing before Inland Wetlands and before Planning and Zoning requires the applicant, usually a developer, to post public signs notifying neighbors of the hearing. Developers usually take the signs down the day after the hearing. Thus, it is somewhat surprising to see that signs announcing an August 4th public hearing are still posted on Country Club Road.

These signs are for a Water and Sewer Department project to install water mains on Country Club Road. The Inland Wetlands Agency public hearing was originally scheduled for the June meeting, but neither the engineer nor the Water and Sewer Department posted the signs, so the public hearing was postponed until the July meeting. When that meeting was canceled due to the failure of City Hall air conditioning, the hearing was rescheduled for August.

Now, over two months after first appearing for the July 7th meeting, the signs remain, looking a bit worse for the wear. The one pictured above had an unfortunate encounter with an errant car a few weeks ago.

Commentary:

It is troubling that the management of the Water and Sewer Department would neglect to send a worker out to take down the signs. This suggests a lack of organization or follow-through in the department.

However, Water and Sewer is not the only Department which could have taken these signs down in the past month. How many times has a city vehicle from Public Works or Parks and Recreation or the Police Department driven by the bedraggled, road-side nuisances? How many times has a City employee (including the directors of Public Works, Planning, etc) driven by the decaying signs? Why have none of them thought to stop and remove them? Why have none of them apparently even thought to make a phone call and remind Water and Sewer to remove them?

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